


Shadows Swallow You Whole

by starmelee



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Gen, Nightmares, Normal AU, okay maybe not normal more like a parallel universe or something, she's a lil violent, some hidden ships if you squint, strifehart is background because I love them as Sora and Roxas's dads, this is a little rough but I liked it, this is also for an exchange event and I hope the person who this is for likes it c:
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-26
Updated: 2020-05-26
Packaged: 2021-03-02 18:20:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,645
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24381190
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starmelee/pseuds/starmelee
Summary: Sora and Roxas are twins bound at the hip for most of their lives. When one goes through something, the other usually follows quickly behind.Unfortunately, the rule applies from beestings to years-long night terrors.
Relationships: Axel & Roxas (Kingdom Hearts), Roxas & Sora (Kingdom Hearts)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 6





	Shadows Swallow You Whole

**Author's Note:**

> This is something I had the concept down for but never felt inspired to finish, but this exchange event gave me the opportunity to do just that! To my giftee, I hope you enjoy this and that it is the kind of fic you were looking for! Stay well, friend!
> 
> PS: The flow of this fic is a little strange, and the concept is a little weird, but I really tried to compose it in a way that makes sense. Hopefully, my weird brain hasn't made this unreadable.

This was it, Roxas realized. He was graduating high school, going to the college of his choice, and moving on to adulthood. He and Sora talked about keeping in touch often, as well as meeting up every weekend for breakfast with Squall and Cloud. They loved their dads, and they had to go anyway because Squall told them that if they didn’t, he would get a Facebook just so that he could post embarrassing photos of them. Sora and Roxas didn’t know what was more terrifying about the threat; the idea of the photos or the thought of their dad getting a Facebook. Cloud would never dream of it, so they didn’t have to worry about him, but Squall… that was a different story. It was enough to make Roxas swear up and down that he would be there for breakfast every Sunday morning. Sora was going to live with them until Riku moved into his new apartment, close to Sora’s own selected college. Even though they were practically on the opposite sides of the state, the twins also promised private hangouts every once in awhile, just to keep up with each other.

Each of them had gotten cars for their seventeenth birthdays, but they weren’t allowed to drive either of them until they turned eighteen. Apparently, Cloud decided that he wanted to make sure they were safe in the “family car” before they drove their own. The “family car” was known to be the only dinosaur to survive the mass extinction, and ran like an old man with two broken legs. It was torture to wait, but when Roxas got into his car on his eighteenth birthday… there was no better feeling. 

Today was the day he would be driving that car upstate to be going to school. College. That place adults went to when they decided what they wanted from their lives. Oh boy. 

His bags had been packed for a few days, minus the backpack he kept emergency supplies in, and the clothing he’d been wearing the past few days. That morning, Squall had been holding back tears, and Roxas was pretty sure Cloud wiped a little high up on his face when using his napkin. Regardless, the hour-long hugs and multiple warnings about hobos and frat parties carried Roxas out of the driveway and onto the road.

It was a day and a half later when he arrived at his new apartment. Honestly, it looked worse when he went to go and see it, so things were already looking up. The floor seemed a little less dirty, and the counters didn’t look quite as greasy. That didn’t mean he didn’t have a lot to work to do to make it a home, though. And work he did. Days were devoted to clearing out all the rooms and thoroughly cleaning them. Floors were swept, vacuumed, and steam cleaned, windows were wiped down, and counters were de-greased. After that, the shower was bleached, as was the toilet, and things became livable.  


The first month was fine. Four family breakfasts in, and Sora was finally living with Riku. Both of the boys discussed their new homes, and how they thought their colleges were perfect. Their dads were pleased, even though Squall seemed a tad disappointed at the fact that they couldn’t come and visit more. Everyone knew that was just the empty nest getting to him, though. 

But something changed, sometime during the second month.

Sora would call Roxas in the middle of the night, asking him if he was okay. Naturally, Roxas would always be a tad grumpy, but Sora’s voice would waver in a way that was just so… so… scared. Like when he had nightmares when they were younger. So, Roxas would assure him he was okay, and they’d both go back to bed. Things were okay.

Roxas suddenly stopped getting the calls, but his nightmares started.

At first, he barely remembered them, the especially quick beating of his heart and sweat-soaked sheets the only hint of one occurring in the first place. Then it escalated to him waking himself up by thrashing, or making a noise. Sometimes his arms would be covered in scratch marks, like he’d desperately been trying for hours to wake himself up. After that, he would start waking up screaming, or sobbing hysterically. It was around this time that he started remembering his night terrors. Finally, he’d given up on sleep altogether, catching random naps when and where he could. 

His fathers and brother seemed concerned, but he always brushed it off. It was a late night studying, or there were mice and it kept him awake. Squall and Cloud always seemed to understand, or if they suspected something they did a good job hiding it. Sora always seemed to have a lingering gaze, but he, too, never questioned it. 

Over time, the dreams grew worse. It was half way through his first semester in which he first died. He’d been stabbed in the chest by a girl he knew to be his friend, in this life. Xion was a sweet, kind-hearted girl who could barely hurt a fly. She didn’t have an evil bone in her body, yet he still grew afraid when he had to text her.

The second time was by Riku, someone he never cared for but still trusted. He always said that it was for Sora’s own good. That he “had to wake up.” But what the hell did that mean!? Sora woke up every morning, went to school, laughed with his friends. Roxas would get out of bed after a restless night, drink as much coffee as possible within two hours, go about his day alone, or talk to his internet friends.

The thirtieth time was by a man he didn’t recognize. He had long, silver hair, and horrifically mesmerizing eyes. Roxas got distracted, something burned through his chest. His vision went blurry, and that was that. 

Eventually, all the talk of “saving Sora” and “being a nobody” was driving him mad. He couldn’t understand why this was happening to him! 

He tried everything to get the dreams to stop, but it was impossible. He tried to ponder what could possibly be causing them, but nothing really possible came to mind. At one point, he wondered if it was a past life haunting him, but then there was just so much magic, so much pain that he couldn't really fathom a world where those things existed. Regardless, the dreams were always too horrible, too real to be fake. Obviously he couldn’t tell anyone, because they’d think he was insane. The weapons were strange, always undeniably impossible, but the feelings were so _real_.

By the end of the first semester, he couldn’t do it anymore. He disconnected his phone and moved out of the state. He couldn’t face his family without being horrified, without experiencing those memories over and over again. It was all he could see when he even thought about his family. When he thought about Sora. He had to put away photos, and hard drives with photos, in a lockable box that he kept in the trunk of his car. As much as he hated looking at them, he still loved his family. That was why he needed to get away from them as quickly as possible.

His new apartment was even worse than the last one. The only solace that he got was the fact he had a neighbor who could sing. It was a blessing that he was as good as he was, otherwise Roxas would have kicked his ass on the second night. However, the man’s voice had this certain effect on him. Usually, Roxas would sleep in the living room on an air mattress so that he could catch the man practicing. It was the only way he could get to bed before six in the morning, and he usually stayed asleep longer than his usual hour and a half per night. On really good ones, he got three hours of sleep.

Roxas tried everything to make the dream stop, but they always haunted him, following him like his own shadow. Every single one involved being sacrificed for Sora’s life. He still didn’t get why so many people wanted him dead, and why no one wanted him for… well, himself. It was always about Sora, and his well being. But no one ever truly cared about him.

He couldn’t help but wonder if that was actually the case.

******  
Zexion really hated to do something like that to Axel, but his family came first. When Roxas went missing without a trace, people contacted the authorities and investigations ensued. 

He was called by his uncle, Squall, who seemed to believe that Roxas headed out his way. Of course, he was close to debating the likelihood of that when he remembered it was about Roxas. He was gone. Possibly forever.

It was almost three months before he went back home to see Axel. He apologized for leaving him and the band behind but explained that his cousin was missing. He’d just vanished out of thin air, and no one knew what to do about it besides hope and pray he would return sometime soon. 

Axel let him stay that night to talk and cry over it. Roxas had been like a sibling, even though they didn’t get much time together. Together, Axel and Zexion sorted through what could have happened, and they decided that he just took off. That night, they also looked over old family photos, and even a few recent ones from just before the boys left for college. Axel had the nagging feeling that Roxas looked familiar.

A few weeks later, Zexion was leaving after having lunch. Axel was walking him to his car, as the winter made the parking lot horribly icy. He stopped short when he noticed a tuft of half blond, half brown hair sticking up from a very, very bedraggled looking man. Zexion recognized him without a beat of hesitation. 

“Zexion, isn’t that-”

“Roxas!” Zexion called, rushing forward to meet his cousin. 

In a moment, Roxas had turned, saw Zexion, and widened his eyes. He then pulled up his snowflake flannel pajama pants and ran out of the lobby as fast as he could, rushing to the parking lot and getting in a car before they could see where he went.

“Do you think he lives here?” Zexion asked him. 

“Probably. We just have to wait and see if we can catch him tomorrow. But explain this whole situation to me again?”

*****  
Roxas crept from his car a little while later, walked back inside, grabbed his mail, and went back to his apartment. He was frozen to the bone, and shivering heavily. This resulted in him bundling up with twenty blankets as he waited for his goodnight call from his neighbor. However, what he got was Zexion talking very loudly.

“Axel, he just got up and left for no reason! Stopped talking to us! We’ve been worried sick! This guy has the fucking audacity to scare the shit out of us like that and RUN AWAY?!”

Anger bubbled up through Roxas’s body, at which he stood up and faced the wall. “You bitch! It wasn’t like that at all! You wouldn’t understand what happened even if I wrote it all down and bashed you in the face with the essay!” Immediately, his hands went to his mouth as dead silence fell over the two apartments.

Suddenly, there was loud shuffling and a bang on his door just a moment later. “ROXAS IF YOU DON’T OPEN THIS DOOR I SWEAR I’LL-” but he was stopped by a quieter, more lax voice. 

“Zexion, relax. Hey, Roxas, I’ve heard a lot about you, but I’d like to hear what you’ve got to say. Maybe books-for-brains wouldn’t understand, but I’d like to try.”

It was the man who sang every night. And he couldn’t say no to that voice… the one that helped soothe him to sleep so many times he’d lost count.

Slowly, Roxas walked up and unlocked the door, opening it cautiously. It was just then he remembered he didn’t have a shirt on, but it was too late to be polite anyway. He just called his cousin a bitch. 

“Roxas I-” he watched as his cousin looked him up and down- “Wait a minute. What happened to you?” 

“What do you mean?” 

“You look half a step up from Jack Skellington!” Zexion pulled him in a hug, which made him hiss in pain. 

“Hey, hands off.” He stepped away and sighed. “I just don’t eat as much as I used to, nothing wrong with losing a little weight.”

“As much as that’s true, dude,” the other man interjected, “you are scarily skinny. Even more so than me, and I’m super underweight.”

Roxas had just noticed the redhead. Something about him seemed oddly familiar, but he couldn’t place the feeling. It could be all in his mind, as most things seemed to be these days. 

“Thanks, Hot Topic reject.” Roxas walked into his kitchen, scouring the mostly empty fridge for the coffee he got on his way home from classes earlier. He reapplied to college because he still wanted to do well for his family, but all it seemed to do was give him an excuse to stay up late.

“I see we’ve got a half-alive one, and he’s even more emo than you, Zexy.” 

The targeted individual sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Shut up, Axel. Roxas, what is going on with you? You haven’t contacted anyone in almost a year, and you look like you’ve been through hell.” Briefly, he paused to think. “Wait, don’t say anything. You’re frozen, about to drink cold coffee, and you look like you haven’t had a half-decent meal in months.” He looked to Axel and they nodded. “Get in the shower, and I’ll bring you to Axel’s place. It seems to be better furnished than yours.”

Roxas had no reason to disobey, so he put his coffee back and got in the shower.

*****

Axel worked as fast as he could. He figured that a little pasta and sauce with meat never killed anyone, especially not at ten at night. If anything, this was kind of tame for it being later in the day. 

He was curious about Roxas. He seemed to snap a bit, but that was because he was scared, that much was obvious. Something had him seriously on edge, and Zexion was determined to find out what it was, that was for sure.

When he saw his two houseguests enter, he made Roxas and himself a plate. Zexion usually didn’t eat pasta, so if he wanted some he could get it himself. 

Seeing someone stare so intently at the floor reminded him of when he was a kid. Roxas seemed like he was just hoping to disappear, almost as if the floor would swallow him whole if he stared long enough. And maybe it would. Staring is rude.

“Here, eat up before it gets cold.” He passed off the plate to Roxas and set his own on his coffee table, moving back into the kitchen. He and Zexion already had drinks, so he just asked Roxas what he wanted and brought him an iced tea. For a guy who almost died of frostbite, he really liked cold drinks.

As they ate, no one said a word. Honestly, it was getting on Axel’s nerves, but he let it roll over him. It wasn’t his place to interfere in a conversation about a family situation. Ten minutes later, when Zexion failed to say something, Axel knew he’d have to pick up the conversation or they’d be like that all night. 

“What can you tell us, Roxas?”

Suddenly, his whole demeanor changed. His shoulders sagged, his brows creased, and he started to tremble. It was lucky that he’d set the plate down because both of his hands flew to his face just a moment later. “I-I..” his voice cracked, and his body hiccuped with an oncoming sob. “I can’t!” He shouted, wiping away the tears that had already started to form.

Roxas crying was like getting a blow to the diaphragm. Axel suddenly found himself unable to breathe completely correctly, leaving him with no clue what to do about it.

“I’m sorry, I really am," Roxas continued to cry into his hands, shaking his head. "I just can't. I couldn't- I-" his voice rose in pitch slightly as it grew harder for him to breathe. 

“Hey, hey, Roxas please calm down, please.” Zexion tried, giving Axel a helpless look. 

Axel figured that he could try and find a solution to this. Maybe if he sang? Usually, people liked hearing him sing, people sang to calm people down in movies, right? Axel started with a quiet hum, then he grew more confident when Roxas's body language started to change. After a minute or so, he was singing softly to Roxas. They all continued like that, sitting around the room until Roxas's sobbing ceased.

“God, I must look like an idiot,” Roxas said quietly, wiping his face. “I-I’m sorry. I just, I don’t want to be called crazy. I don’t think I can handle it… But I guess I’ll just tell you the basics right now.”

He explained how his night terrors kept him from getting more than two hours of sleep on average, adding that Axel’s voice often soothed him into better rests than most anything else. He also explained how most of his calorie intake had been replaced by coffee over food. Apparently, his job just gave him enough to afford a coffee machine and a good can of grounds every now and again. 

Once he was done talking, it took a couple of minutes for him to pipe up again. However, he suddenly stood up and ran into Axel’s bathroom, the sounds of vomiting sounding through the small apartment.

Axel and Zexion were mortified, to put it simply. What could they do for him? Obviously he was against seeing his family and going to the hospital. Zexion just wanted his happy cousin back. He wanted Roxas to be happy, not… whatever this amalgamation of depression, anxiety, and horror was. But what could he do?

Axel decided that the only thing they could do was provide their companion with some comfort, so he grinned at his neighbor and let Zexion go home. Roxas wasn't going to be alone if it was the last thing he could ever be able to help with.

*****  
Sora was a disaster. The second Roxas didn’t answer his phone that one Friday night he knew. He tried to tell Riku, but he told him that he was overreacting. Imagine how rough that must have felt when Sora had been right. When they found out Roxas was gone.

Leon and Cloud hadn’t slept a full night since the day Sora brought it up, and none of them had really gotten any peace of mind. How could they, when Roxas was just gone? No traces, no proof that someone kidnapped him. The phone company said he disconnected his phone, even had camera footage of him walking in and doing it. 

Sora couldn’t unsee the blank look on Roxas’s face. It was like he was a zombie.

No matter what Riku and Kairi did, neither of them could get him to leave his house. Cloud and Leon let him move back in, and Sora was pretty sure they were going to ask anyway. He would spend his days on the computer, taking online courses and looking at any and all social media to see if Roxas was out there, somewhere. He wasn’t, apparently, which made everything so much worse.

His own nightmares had returned in full force, some of them coming to points where Roxas would battle him. Usually he would forget who Roxas was, or people would forget about him, but it never went into fighting. Sometimes he would watch Roxas get beaten up by people they knew. Like Riku, or Xion, Roxas’s internet friend. At one point Riku killed Roxas after disarming him. 

He refused to see his friends after that. 

*****  
Cloud and Leon were growing desperate. Yet again they reached out to Zexion to see if he’d found anything out. 

The conversation was slow, and tedious, but Zexion admitted that he knew where Roxas was. However, the boy had sworn him to secrecy, and Zexion had to explain that he couldn’t say. Roxas wasn’t ready to face anyone yet. He was still too afraid. 

“Why? Why would he be afraid to come home?”

“Because he’s just stuck. He doesn’t want to face whatever has been running through his head for months now, and seeing you just makes everything hurt.”

*****  
Roxas didn’t want to do it. He couldn’t look at Sora without wanting to cry, or scream, or just curl up and die on the spot. Two years of being degraded, of being considered less by so many people in his dreams. The only people he felt any sense of comfort with was Axel and Zexion, and they could barely coax information out of him. 

Though, Axel did manage to convince him to have a sleepover, just to see if he could boost the amount of sleep Roxas was getting. Of course, the insomniac strongly doubted it would work, but anything was worth a shot. 

That night, he had a nightmare once more. 

Blood. So much blood. It soaked into his clothes, into his skin. He could feel it across his face. That was all he could feel. These people were nothing, but he was everything. Darkness. That’s what he was fighting for. But wait, wasn’t he supposed to be against it? 

He blinks, and for a brief moment, everything stops. Then, he’s looking at the ground. Xion. Demyx. Axel. Zexion. Xigbar. He didn't even know some of these people but… did he? They’re dead, but that makes no sense… what had he done?

He turned, and stared into a reflection. But it was wrong: he wasn’t Sora. Why was Sora looking back at him, with that stupid grin on his face and so much light in his eyes? Why… 

“Roxas!” Axel shouted, trying to be heard over the boy’s screams.

With a start Roxas went to sit up, but found that he was pinned underneath Axel. The poor guy had certainly seen better days, but why was he holding Roxas down like that?

“You got up and walked away, but you just collapsed on the ground and started crying. I carried you back over here, but you started screaming.” Axel’s eyes were wide with concern, and likely some adrenaline.

“I did?” He shook off Axel’s hands and wiped his cheeks, both of which were damp with tears.

Axel sat with him for a while, his arm wrapped around Roxas's shoulder. They talked about simple things, like Axel's band, Roxas's day job, aimless topics like their favorite colors and foods and flowers. Roxas felt affection grow for his companion, and it was easy to see why people seemed to like him so much. He had a nice voice and a nice heart. In all honesty, he'd had a crush on his sweet-voiced neighbor for quite some time. It was nice to actually get to know the goofball, himself.

A few hours later, it was two in the morning. Axel passed out a little while after the whole incident, and Roxas took the liberty of staying awake. He had actually wandered to sit outside quite some time ago, just to play a game on his phone in peace. 

He’d just been nodding off when it buzzed in his hand. Out of instinct, he answered the call immediately. 

“Hello?” Sora’s voice called to him through the receiver. 

“I- Sora? Ho-how did you get this number, I-”

“Please, don’t hang up. I know this is my fault. I'm sorry. You don't deserve to suffer through this with me. But you aren't lesser than me. You're my twin brother. We are different people, but that doesn't mean we both aren't good. That doesn’t mean you don’t deserve love. Please come home, Roxas. Let us help you.”

Roxas sat in silence for a few moments before hitting the END CALL button. A few more hours of thinking had him sighing periodically and looking in himself. He needed this. 

He walked to his car in the parking lot of his building, pulling his keys out of his pocket. He unlocked the door, got in, buckled up, and turned the key. 

It was about time he went home.

*****  
He still had the house key, thankfully. Slowly, he turned it in the lock and walked inside, shutting the door behind him and taking off his shoes. Carefully, he navigated the hardwood floors of the entrance to his home until he saw the kitchen isle’s light was on. Standing at the dimly lit counter, drinking coffee, was Cloud.

Briefly, he glanced up, expecting to see Squall home from his third-shift job. His eyes froze on the small, pale figure of his son. Suddenly, his coffee cup was on the counter and his father had Roxas firmly pressed into his chest. 

“Roxas, is that you? Is that really you?”

“Y-yeah pa, it’s me.” 

They both stood there and cried for what seemed to be hours, but was really only thirty minutes. At five-thirty, Squall got home. At five thirty-one, Roxas was embraced even tighter by his dad. 

At six, Sora walked in and stopped just two yards away. 

Roxas separated from his parents and walked up to Sora, grabbing his shoulder and pulling him in for a hug. There was no hesitation. 

“I forgive you. I forgive him. I forgive all of you.”

And they stood there until the sun rose. No more tears, no more hiding away. Just the smell of coffee, and a reunited family at sunrise.

(Tiny epilogue, because I couldn’t help myself:)

Axel came by a few days later with Zexion, his beat-up car looking out of place in the driveway filled with shiny, worked-on vehicles Cloud spent so much time fixing up. They also looked out of place in their home, but Roxas was happy to sit with them on a separate couch over lunch. Axel had seemed like he was genuinely worried, but now that he had seen Roxas in person, his shoulders had loosened up and he wore an easy smile. 

As the day bled into nighttime, Roxas was at the door saying his goodbyes. Axel and Zexion would be staying at the latter’s family home so Axel could drive home in the morning. 

“So,” Axel began, standing in the doorway with him while Zexion was saying goodbye to his family inside. “I would really like to take you out sometime. Maybe you’ll consider swooping by one of my band’s gigs so I can take you out for dinner after?”

Roxas chuckled, shaking his head. “I guess it’s the least I can do to repay my siren in shining armor. And you’re my neighbor, so it’s not like I could escape you.” 

Axel laughed, reaching a hand out to ruffle Roxas’s hair. “Smartass. I’ll see you whenever you decide to get home again. And you better come out with me because you want to. I don’t do one night stands.” 

Not fifteen minutes later, Roxas was waving the two of them off. When he turned to go inside, he saw Sora waggling his eyebrows. 

“Shut up!” Roxas laughed, shoving his brother out of the way. 

“I didn't even say anything!” 

"We're twins," Roxas called back, "I can basically hear your thoughts. And I have eyes. Your eyebrows hold no secrets."

They grinned at each other. For once, it seemed like things were going right.


End file.
